chapter-36904.pdf

This paper aims to demonstrate that cults and cultic institutions are a crucial element for understanding the processes producing different regional outcomes after the fall of the Hittite empire. In this paper, cults are understood as normative cosmic forces defining tempo and worldview of ancient s...

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Γλώσσα:English
Έκδοση: Firenze University Press 2023
Διαθέσιμο Online:https://books.fupress.com/doi/capitoli/979-12-215-0042-4_11
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spelling oapen-20.500.12657-625882024-03-28T08:18:37Z Chapter Rulership and the Gods: The Role of Cultic Institutions in the Late Bronze to Iron Age Transition in Anatolia and Northern Syria d'Alfonso, Lorenzo Lovejoy, Nathan institution temple kingship Syro-Anatolia post-Hittite thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History This paper aims to demonstrate that cults and cultic institutions are a crucial element for understanding the processes producing different regional outcomes after the fall of the Hittite empire. In this paper, cults are understood as normative cosmic forces defining tempo and worldview of ancient societies. Cultic institutions can be identified as physical spaces defined by purity, charged with real and symbolic value, and led by specialists whose competence is recognised by the community. Instead of being a by-product of political complexity, they are a driving force behind the power dynamics because they are perceived as such in a bottom-up perspective, but also often by main political actors in search of legitimation of their power. This paper examines the interconnections between cultic and political institutions in the territory under the Hittite empire and in the same space after the empire’s demise. We aim to distinguish between processes of resilience, reorganisation, and transformation as they occurred in particular micro-regions previously controlled by the empire, including the Upper Euphrates, South-Central Anatolia, North-Central Anatolia, Cilicia, and the Northern Levant; this will demonstrate both the importance of such a micro-regionally defined study, as well as the shared coincidence of cultic and political institutional change. It will become evident that cultic continuity coincided with the resilience of political institutions, and changes in the cultic landscape corresponded to political reorganisations or transformations in post-Hittite Anatolia and north Syria. 2023-05-01T13:37:13Z 2023-05-01T13:37:13Z 2023 chapter ONIX_20230501_9791221500424_4 2612-808X 9791221500424 https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/62588 eng Studia Asiana application/pdf Attribution 4.0 International chapter-36904.pdf https://books.fupress.com/doi/capitoli/979-12-215-0042-4_11 Firenze University Press 10.36253/979-12-215-0042-4.11 10.36253/979-12-215-0042-4.11 bf65d21a-78e5-4ba2-983a-dbfa90962870 9791221500424 13 38 Florence open access
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language English
description This paper aims to demonstrate that cults and cultic institutions are a crucial element for understanding the processes producing different regional outcomes after the fall of the Hittite empire. In this paper, cults are understood as normative cosmic forces defining tempo and worldview of ancient societies. Cultic institutions can be identified as physical spaces defined by purity, charged with real and symbolic value, and led by specialists whose competence is recognised by the community. Instead of being a by-product of political complexity, they are a driving force behind the power dynamics because they are perceived as such in a bottom-up perspective, but also often by main political actors in search of legitimation of their power. This paper examines the interconnections between cultic and political institutions in the territory under the Hittite empire and in the same space after the empire’s demise. We aim to distinguish between processes of resilience, reorganisation, and transformation as they occurred in particular micro-regions previously controlled by the empire, including the Upper Euphrates, South-Central Anatolia, North-Central Anatolia, Cilicia, and the Northern Levant; this will demonstrate both the importance of such a micro-regionally defined study, as well as the shared coincidence of cultic and political institutional change. It will become evident that cultic continuity coincided with the resilience of political institutions, and changes in the cultic landscape corresponded to political reorganisations or transformations in post-Hittite Anatolia and north Syria.
title chapter-36904.pdf
spellingShingle chapter-36904.pdf
title_short chapter-36904.pdf
title_full chapter-36904.pdf
title_fullStr chapter-36904.pdf
title_full_unstemmed chapter-36904.pdf
title_sort chapter-36904.pdf
publisher Firenze University Press
publishDate 2023
url https://books.fupress.com/doi/capitoli/979-12-215-0042-4_11
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